Education motivates Womick, Dickerson

Incumbent vs. teacher in race

Oct. 9, 2012

Rick Womick mug

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Rick Womick

Party: Republican Age: 54 Occupation: Commercial pilot; Air Force veteran, spent three years as a teacher in Ohio Family: Married to wife Jan, for 24 years, four children How long have you lived in Rutherford County? Since January 1993 Community Involvement: Attends New Vision Baptist Church, former chairman of the Rutherford County Republican Party On the Web:www.voterickwomick.comE-mail: rick@voterickwomick.com

Luke Dickerson

Party: Democrat Age: 28 Occupation: Teacher, Murfreesboro City Schools Family: Single How long have you lived in Rutherford County? 28 years Community Involvement: Attends Calvary Baptist On the Web:www.lukedickerson.usE-mail:dickerson4rutherford@gmail.com

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MURFREESBORO — For incumbent 34th District state Rep. Rick Womick and challenger Luke Dickerson, education lies close to their hearts.

Womick, R-Rockvale, taught school for a couple of years in Ohio before joining the Air Force in 1983. Dickerson, D-Murfreesboro, currently works as a special education teacher at Northfield Elementary. The pair hope their experiences and messages resonate with voters as they head to the polls for early voting beginning Oct. 17 and on election day, Nov. 6.

Tennessee’s teachers face challenges with the state’s adoption of teacher evaluation systems. Womick noted that each district was given the option of choosing from a few different models, but most went with the Tennessee Educator Acceleration Model, which drew a lot of criticism from classroom teachers and administrators alike.

“In Memphis and Chattanooga, they use TIGER, which has a lot to do with the teacher’s individual development, and they love it. I may be asking the (state Education Commissioner Kevin Huffman) to look at the possibility of adopting that statewide,” Womick said.

Dickerson, who is entering his fourth year teaching English as a second language, said the reason many districts didn’t adopt TIGER was because of the associated cost.

“The state is only supporting and funding TEAM. I think an evaluation system is important, but not worth spending $130 million like the state has. I think the most teacher growth and learning will come from Professional Learning Communities that we use here in Murfreesboro City and Rutherford County schools and having principals that are good leaders,” he said.

Both candidates said they’re leaning on voters from each party to share their thoughts and concerns about what’s going on in government.

“Knocking on doors and talking to folks is the part I like the most,” Womick said. He added, “I don’t think we should vote along party lines. I think people are tired of party affiliations.”

A father of four, Womick said teachers are concerned about education but the rest of voters have concerns about jobs, the economy and the Affordable Care Act, often referred to as Obamacare.

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“Gov. (Bill) Haslam and (state Department of Economic and Community Development) have done a great job recruiting businesses. We’ve done a lot to reduce regulations on small businesses, but we can do more. We’ve got to let them grow,” he said.

Dickerson said the state has done an outstanding job creating a business-friendly climate, but the trouble with Tennessee landing highly desirable jobs falls to workforce preparation.

“We have to make sure the infrastructure is prepared, and we have a great location, but we need to do a better job of educating the workforce. We’ll see a lot of education reform in the next few years and I want to make sure those changes are done properly,” he said.

He said more emphasis must be placed on jobs with an origin in the areas known as STEM — science, technology, engineering and math.

“I worked with a STEM program at MTSU two years ago and we prepared younger students for those areas. For every person with a STEM degree, there are two jobs waiting on them when they graduate college. But for non-STEM degrees, a job is available for one in every four people,” Dickerson said. “We need to make sure we can fill those jobs in Tennessee without bringing people in from other states or countries.”